Laura Dern’s Inland Empire

By Elliot V. Kotek
(Moving Pictures Business & Technology issue, Feb/Mar 2007)

On Laura Dern's performance in David Lynch's latest experiment in surreal storytelling, the New York Times' Manohla Dargis stated, "Ms. Dern and her amazing rubber band mouth, which laughs like the sun and cries us a river, proves a magnificent guide." Marking twenty years since their collaborative efforts on the highly acclaimed Blue Velvet and Wild at Heart, the reunion on Inland Empire once again has the director's esoteric environment inspiring Dern to achieve one of the year's most captivating performances.

Having sued her parents as a child to protect her right to act, then proceeding to appear alongside her mother, Diane Ladd, in a half-dozen feature films, Dern's passion for a life encompassed by creativity is unflappable. Still cited as the most successful former Miss Golden Globe in Hollywood Foreign Press history, Dern's intuition in identifying visionary filmmakers before others is enviable (must be in the genes) - but it is her down-to-earth (seemingly Southern) charm, despite periods of life in the storm of the public's eye, that mark her performances as simply awe-inspiring. On the eve of yet another Sundance Film Festival appearance, Laura Dern allowed Moving Pictures the following insights.

MPM: Can you approach a Lynch film as a story or do you just have to do each scene on its own merits and trust that he'll edit it in a fashion that makes a complete picture?
Laura Dern: [Inland Empire] was definitely the idea of David presenting, "Let's experiment; let's explore; I'm interested in exploring with digital; let's play a little bit." The excitement about going to work was just the experiment itself, but quickly he started to see a story in his own mind's eye. And then you sort of have to have trust as you find your way to the character and to the story. Even though he's kind of clear in his mind where he's going, I kind of found out along the way.

MPM: So how do you know what he wants from a scene?
Laura Dern: I think the most wonderful thing about him, from an actor's point of view, is that David gives you so much room just because of the world he creates, which is so full of surrealism and abstract that there's never too far to go, and he loves you to try to be brave in your choices. At the same time, he's very specific about what he needs from you. As much as there was no script at the beginning, every scene that we did was written - even if it was written the night before or the day of, you're not improvising dialogue and he definitely knows that he wants you to move from A to Z. Robert Altman gives you freedom even with regard to the blocking, the dialogue; everything is improvised, but emotionally he has a very clear idea of what he needs from you. With David it's kind of the opposite. David knows exactly the way he wants it to look and where he wants you to be, and even what stance he wants you to take, but he wants you to have complete freedom for what the person is going to feel emotionally in that place.

[David] speaks like a painter. He describes things in really unusual ways; if he wants a feeling from something, he gives it a symbol or an archetype or a flavor or a product to describe the thing. I remember on Wild at Heart, whenever he needed specifics for my character, Lula, he'd always be like, "No, no, no, that's not it. More bubblegum, more bubblegum." And I knew exactly what he meant - "bubblegum" really describes the way that character was somehow. Or to Nicolas Cage: "More Elvis; I need more Elvis on that." So he can be very, very specific in a feeling or a mood that he wants. His specifics come in wonderful packages that are kind of fun for an actor - you've been given a key, but you are given the freedom to explore what the key means or what door it's going to open.

MPM: I saw that you've got a co-producer credit on the film. Was that just because it took so long?
Laura Dern: I think it's just David going, "Oh my gosh, she hung in there for three-plus years - I better give her a little more than acting credits!" There was certainly never a trailer to be found and a very small, or no, crew a lot of the time. So I think the credit is about the team-mate aspect of the production.

MPM: What did you think when you found he was sitting on the street corner with the cow to tout you for the Best Performance awards for the season?
Laura Dern: So many emotions at once - it was a mixture of complete adoration and love of him being just fed up with the typical movie business style of selling [award] packages. And his appreciation for me and for actors sincerely moved me, and his being a performance artist is just hilarious and fantastic, and his bravery and boldness to make a new path - which is the essence of this movie to David.

From the cow on Hollywood Boulevard; to self-distribution; to making a movie on the crudest, cheapest digital handheld camera he could get his hands on; to making the movie the way he wanted to make it on his own dime; to [the film] being close to three hours; to making it for three years - every single way he touched this film was an experiment, and so that was just the icing on the cake.

I love the extremes. It's a very exciting world to live in, to be around ones that are really pushing the envelope.

MPM: At what point did you know this wasn't just the family business but a career of your own choosing?
Laura Dern: I think that took me until my late teens and early 20s to really own that. When I did Smooth Talk, I was 16, it was my first lead in a film and it was very emotional and I was crying day after day in scenes, and I remember coming back to my hotel room and was like, "Really? This is what I want to do?" - because crying every day is not that fun; dredging up, you know, feelings of emotion to do what? I couldn't really understand it.

To be honest, a real turning point for me was finding my own teacher, who helped me find a way to think of films as an opportunity to learn about myself and about people, and not to batter oneself, but to heal oneself, or to wake up to something: an idea, a thought, a political point of view, an emotion. I do love film for that and believe in film for that.

MPM: But when your parents said "no" and you wanted to continue - was that indicative of your will to act or your will to rebel?
Laura Dern: I think in my gut it was because I knew I wanted to be an actor and I had fallen in love with it. I really fell in love with it when I was about seven: It was summer vacation, and my dad was outside of L.A. doing a film with Hitchcock and my mom was in Tucson doing a film with Scorsese. I went back and forth between the two locations for my summer vacation, and I remember at the end of that summer thinking this is what I'm going to do with my life. But I was watching the best, and I was watching collaboration and respect and admiration and irreverence and improvisation and boldness and nastiness and bravery and '70s filmmaking, and I was going, "Ooh that looks good. I want to do that."

I had a very luxurious introduction, and so I don't know if I would have fallen in love with acting for the things I love it for, or have had the longevity I've had [otherwise]. I believe in what the experience of making a movie can be, based on how I was introduced to it. So now I only pine for that. The positive is I believe in it being that; the negative is I'd love to work more, but I, at times, foolishly sit around waiting for those opportunities.

That is why I play the people I play and I've done the movies I've done. They all - Citizen Ruth, Rambling Rose, certainly all the work with David - I mean they're all in a very specific, independent spirit, you know? And frankly, I include Jurassic Park in that, because Steven [Spielberg] is a visionary. When he made Jaws, an action horror film wasn't a genre that was successful; or Close Encounters. I mean, "What? A movie about aliens? Are they kidding me?" Or ET? He's done unbelievably unique things, and when he called, I was like, "What? He's doing a movie about dinosaurs?" But it's Steven Spielberg. I feel like what that time taught me was, you go with the visionary. You allow yourself to be part of the team to fulfill someone with independent vision their view, their point of view, you know; you give them their voice.

MPM: Your parents initially pushed you away from acting, but after you proved your commitment to your craft, did they then mentor you?
Laura Dern: I think how they mentored me was, they're big believers in being students of the craft of acting and so they sort of required it of me if they were going to let me go on auditions. I wasn't allowed to consider an audition until I had studied for two and a half years. That was the first thing, and I'm really grateful for that.

And they've mentored me in understanding the ebb and flow of careers, the absurdity of focus on physical, focus on age, focus on hotness - all of the things that your parents mentor you in just merely by walking through it in front of you - and I think that's assisted me greatly in my own happiness as an actor.

Where else they've mentored early in my career was in tough decision-making, because there were decisions I had to make where it wasn't a right or a wrong; it was, "What kind of career do you want? Who do you really want to work with? What kind of money are you willing to let go of?" There were several times early in my career where I was offered two things at the same time. and it was scary. They were there to talk through those moments with me from their perspective as actors, as opposed to the search for being a starlet or whatever, you know?

MPM: Were there people outside your family to whom you looked?
Laura Dern: Absolutely. My godmother, Shelly Winters - when I was younger I ran things by her and asked her opinion about people. Steven Spielberg has been a wonderful friend in that way; I've called him a few times when having to make a big work decision, and run something by him from his perspective. My friend, Mary Steenburgen, whom I respect so much as an actor. Mary Kay Place. Different actresses I've worked with in my life who have a very mature take on a certain kind of role or film, or people who have previously worked with the same filmmaker.

We're all trying to help each other, and it's wonderful to have a community of friends. You've just gotta make sure you're like minded. I term it a tribe because you sort of do find your tribe amongst the masses of whatever you do in life.

MPM: Have you ever wanted to be that visionary? You directed The Gift. Is there a driving force to play a different part within the collaborative process?
Laura Dern: There absolutely is, and just like my introduction to film, I don't know if it's because I was born to direct or merely because I was born as a lover of movies and sitting around waiting for interesting films as an actor is just not that damn fun.

So I have got to find a way to be part of filmmaking as much as possible. I think that passion is what drew or grew into commitment to David for three years, because to be part of the process of exploring is so exciting to me. Directing, producing... that will be an extension of my career and yet part of the same. It all just comes from loving movies, whether it's studying or listening to Lee [Strasberg], watching a movie, hearing Eva Marie Saint tell a story, being an actor, being a director or producing your friends' movie for a million bucks so you see it get made.

MPM: Has having children changed the way you approach your work or your relationship to your work?
Laura Dern: I remember reading people saying that and being like, "Oh God, here we go again, another woman talking about how having a baby really changed her," but it's so true. I have absolutely no judgment anymore, shame on me, because it's another moment in life that has you redefining everything: your relationship to the environment, your relationship to the art, your relationship to your president, your relationship to yourself, to your everything. Frankly, there's a different kind of pressure when you become a parent - you want to look out for different people, you want to say different things, but mostly, for me as an actress and a woman, I kind of wasn't that interested in work. I went immediately into just wanting to be with my child. And then something kicks in, and when it does kick in, it's filled with more obsession and passion than there ever was. And I don't think that's only just that I had children, it's also that it's the first time since I was 11 [that] I actually took time off.

It was the first time I actually called my agent and said, "Don't call me, don't send me a script." When my son was born, for 18 months I just kind of stopped, and I'd never done that in my life and I think that was really good for me. And with my daughter, I took some time off, but I had the luxury of working with David through my pregnancy and through the first year and a half of her life, so if I didn't feel like working, we didn't have to.

MPM: What about being partnered with a musician whose messages in his work are so strong? Does that make you look differently at the meaning behind the films you choose to take?
Laura Dern: I don't feel that either having partnered with Ben or having children has changed my choices, but certainly being with him and watching him work has inspired me to want to be creative all the time. He writes all the time. He's got his guitar all the time. It's such a beautiful thing to watch someone just be in their creative life. It's really inspiring, and that is an exciting thing to be around. Having been raised by actors, I watched people creatively frustrated a lot. You know, waiting for the call, and that is not fun.

Before I ever met him, I thought he was saying things that, in our generation, very few people were saying, as well as just making incredible music.

There is something wonderful about us having different careers, because there's never a feeling of being part of each other's career, or knowing the best advice or not knowing it. We're both creative people, but we live our own creative lives.

MPM: Year of the Dog just premiered at Sundance, and you received an Independent Vision Award from them in '99. What does Sundance mean to you?
Laura Dern: It's been a huge lighthouse to always find your way to a specific kind of work you're aspiring to do - and I mean Sundance as an institute: the lab, the people involved. I've been impressed throughout my life with what it represents, and that starts with Smooth Talk, when I was 17, having come out of the lab... I might have won the first year of the Sundance festival. I feel like I've been involved on some level since its inception. A very dear friend and brilliant cameraman and cinematographer who just passed away, James Glennon, was very involved at Sundance lab, and we would go together in the summers and work with different directors, and I loved that experience. I particularly love that they support short film and documentaries the way they do, too.

MPM: Have you seen a marked change in the Sundance Film Festival over the years?
Laura Dern: Oh, yeah. For me the change is in this: trying to find a way to get me a coach ticket on USAir for Smooth Talk to getting flown there and getting free Chapstick on Citizen Ruth to, when I went for the award, it being like I was queen for a day. And then on We Don't Live Here Anymore, I got a whole kitchen set. I got toaster ovens, I got a watch, I got a cell phone. [But] as much as people want to say, "Ooh Sundance has changed, there's so much swag, there's Hollywood parties, it's such a scene," what I love is [that] Geoffrey Gilmore is still picking movies because there are filmmakers who have a voice, and you still go there to see work that you've never seen before, and you can still go there and discover somebody who made their first three-minute movie who's going to be one of the most important filmmakers of our time, or documentarians who've been in Iraq looking at the truth, and movies are going to get made and bought and people will have a future because of it as artists. When I could barely get my ticket to USAir, there also weren't distributors there trying to buy movies, you know?

MPM: Mike White has an interesting history in indie film, from Chuck & Buck and The Good Girl on to School of Rock and Nacho Libre. What's Year of the Dog about, and how did you become involved?
Laura Dern: I have loved him for a long time as a writer, and he and I tried to do a movie together a long, long time ago. It was earlier in his career, and in the world of raising money and all of that, we struggled our way to try to get it made. I always, from that day forward, wanted to be part of his first movie when he finally got to direct.

The movie, itself, was a really brave idea because it is simply a love story between a woman [Molly Shannon] and her dog. An emotional or personal note about it is I had actually just lost my beloved dog, my 13-year-old dog, about four days before Mike called me, so there was no way I was not going to be part of this. Everyone feels like they're not allowed to somehow feel bad that their animal died when there's so much trouble in the world - that they're being too overdramatic. Everybody's somehow apologetic for being devastated if they go through that loss.

When I first worked with Alexander Payne and Jim Taylor, nobody quite understood why I was doing it; people are always ready to judge someone who hasn't done it before. But I felt about them the way I feel about Mike in that I know Mike has a really profoundly unique and important voice in film for the future. I miss being on the set. I want to make a very long movie with him that takes place, I don't know, in India, and we have to shoot for six months. I'd love to do that if I could do it with Mike White. I'd laugh my ass off and never be bored.

MPM: Another project you worked on for a short time while filming Inland Empire: How was working with Russell Crowe on Tenderness?
Laura Dern: Absolutely incredible. It's so interesting, because everybody has a take on how someone's going to be to work with, and, like Sean Penn when I first worked with Sean Penn, it's wonderful to work with someone gifted. To try anything; to try everything. It's a great and rare pleasure. You have a partner in going wherever the scene could take you, you know? And you never get locked into one idea.

MPM: Was it kind of that cliché of feeling like you're working without a safety net?
Laura Dern: It was a cliché; that is perfectly put. It's true because it's honest, it's not flash. Nobody is doing it because they want to be unusual or make an unusual choice; they're doing it because the behavior is taking them that way and it's human and it's real and it's honest in the moment and the now. I guess really brave acting is really simple acting, and that's the key, and it takes specific people to want to be honest and simple and in the moment. I have found that, often, they're the actors who can also be the most extreme and out there. And that's what I feel is the luxury of working with David [Lynch]: Once you go out, you can really bring yourself back in a really simple and pure way - hopefully, anyway. -MPM

Photos, top to bottom:
Sam Neil, Richard Attenborough and Jeff Goldblum were Dern's Jurassic Park partners on Spielberg's set.
Laura Dern
Dern was "bubblegum" to Cage's Elvis in Lynch's inspired Wild at Heart.
Kyle MacLachlan puts the diner's booth to use in Lynch's lustful Blue Velvet.